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Friday, 12 February 2010

The Owl's readers have Labor and the Coalition running neck and neck on primary votes when it comes to predicting the result of next week’s Newspoll. At midday today the calculations put Labor on 41%, Liberals on 37% and the Nationals 4% (to give the Coalition a combined 41%.) The predicted primary vote the Greens is 11% with others on 7%.

The guesstimate of how that will work out in two-party preferred terms is Labor 53% to the Coalition’s 47%. As I regularly take such delight in making fun of the predictions of economists it is only fair that I lead with my own chin and predict Newspoll will show things as 50:50.

Perhaps we have a bias towards the lefties among the entrants because the expectation is that Kevin Rudd’s approval rating will go back up to 53% from the 50% mark actually recorded in the last Newspoll while those satisfied with how Tony Abbott is doing his job as Opposition leader is expected to be recorded at 39% compared with his last actual figure of 41%.